Thursday, December 18, 2014

For the past week or so I've been following a story of a supposed 9 ft Bigfoot, referred to as 'Big Joe,' in Tallapoosa County, Alabama. I've been very suspicious of this information since it was reported by Cryptozoology News. The Alabama Bigfoot Society has recently posted a YouTube video...though, I'm not sure if this lends much credibility to the story - Alabama Adventures - Getting Close To Bigfoot, Big Joe The 9 ft. Sasquatch (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBDcY9fZeQc).

I started digging into my archives to see if I had any information on Bigfoot sightings in the same general area. I did come across a whimsical account from the Alabama Appalachians of a Bigfoot that went by the name of 'Joe,' who had a habit of visiting the local small-town diner each morning for a cup of coffee. It seems that Joe wasn't much of a conversationalist...but who simply sat at the counter in order to receive his 'cup of joe.'

Anyway...here's the article on 'Big Joe':

ZANA, Ala.– Four people claim to have seen a “very large black Bigfoot” along Alabama State Route 22 in the Tallapoosa County area.

The sightings, documented by Bigfoot researcher Jim Smith, took place within a 4-mile radius around mile marker 135.

“‘Big Joe’ was spotted twice within about a 4 week time,” said Smith, 58 and founder of the Alabama Bigfoot Society.

According to the investigator, the first report was submitted by a woman who claimed to have been driving on the night of Halloween when they spotted the creature last year.

“There is a hunting trail that goes into the woods,” he said. ” When they came upon the curve, they looked out to the woods and saw the black Bigfoot walking down through the woods.”

And when Smith went to the area to investigate the report about a month later, he became a second witness.

“It was around thanksgiving week when I first saw him. When I came around the curve, that’s when I saw him. He wasn’t that far from the road, but he was walking down through the woods.”

“He was very muscular, he was very large, he was very wide, and he was also black,” he said about the animal.

Another man, who was reportedly traveling east on the same highway, said it was “almost dark” when he came across the creature.

“He only got about somewhere around 70 to 80 yards from this sign,” said Smith. “The sign is reflective, like all road signs are, and he said that when his lights hit it, he could see this Bigfoot, very tall Bigfoot.”

The man claimed that as he approached the beast, it strode across the road and that it “took only three steps to cross it” before vanishing into the woods.

“It takes about 9 steps to cross this road,” Smith said.

The alleged Sasquatch was described by the man as having “flowing hair” on the neck and head.

“The height of the Bigfoot… we took a ruler and we measured. The Bigfoot’s head was on this yellow sign, so we measured that and that would have made this particular Bigfoot, that I believe it was ‘Big Joe’ also, about 9 feet tall.”

An additional witness said it was Christmas Eve of the same year and that he and his family were driving west when they saw the “large black Bigfoot walking through a patch of woods” in the foggy afternoon.

It is not the first time that Smith has an encounter with this creature. He claims to have seen it many times throughout the years. The founder of the Alabaman research organization is a “no-kill” Sasquatch advocate aiming to protect the purported creature’s habitat.

“Only, when this first sighting occurred in Alabama, I didn’t know what a Bigfoot was. In those days we called it a ‘Giant Monkey’,” he told Cryptozoology News.

“I don’t intend to kill or try to kill one,” he says. “I know this feeling comes from my Indian blood. I know it exists and I don’t need a body to prove it.”

They believe “Bigfoot” is “another human species” or “a cross between human and something else”.

Reports of drivers spotting the creature on busy roads is not unusual. Many of these type of sightings end up being animal misidentifications.

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